Make Audacity only record when it hears a asound?

[ulrichburke]

Dear Anyone.

I'm a wannabe composer. I have a notation program that lets me select a virtual instrument and write a tune on it.

So I've got 8 (say) virtual instruments and a finished piece of music. I want to record each track as a separate soundfile so I can mix them. For this to be easy, all the soundfiles have to be the same length so you can line 'em up accurately in the mixer.

Can you set up Audacity so it ONLY starts recording when it hears a sound? Right now, I have to press RECORD on Audacity, it starts recording nothing (silence) then I race over to the music program window, press PLAY on a track and it starts recording the track. The problem is, as it takes varying amounts of time to get from Audacity's window to the music software window, the files are always slightly differing lengths and I just cannot line them up accurately. All the instruments are a little bit out of synch and it kills all the pieces of music.

So one answer - if you can think of another, tell me - would be to be able to press RECORD on Audacity, but it doesn't start doing anything until you've pressed PLAY on the music software. If not all instruments start right at the beginning of a track, that's fine, I can put in a tiny sound that the listener wouldn't really hear, but which would trigger Audacity's recording to start. It's OK having leftover silence at the END of the instrument's part, because you can happily chop it off. It's getting the individual instrument tracks so you can line them all up ACCURATELY at the beginning of a track that's the nightmare.

Is it possible to set Audacity up so it's sound activated?

Yours hopefully

Ulrichburke (noobus maximus giganticus.)

[Irish]

Audacity Version 1.3.12 has Sound Activated Recording.

You can download it from here

http://audacityteam.org/download/

However, an easier way to do it is to record the tracks as you are doing now, and use the time-shift tool (the double-headed arrow) to slide the tracks back and forward so that they line up. You can zoom in as close as you want, in order to get them exactly right.
Take your time getting back to the music program to start the music; you can edit each track to cut away the silence at the beginning. That's the way the professionals do it (think of the Beatles tapes that have the conversations before they start to play).

The time-shift tool and track handling work much better in 1.3 than in 1.2, so I would recommend upgrading in any case.

PO'L

[kozikowski]

Sound Activated Recording sometimes misses part of the first note and it might stop recording if you take a breath or have a short silent portion of the show. Much better to record everything and in post production, cut and slide individual performances until they line up.

All the convenient editing and track management tools are in Audacity 1.3.12.

Koz

[steve]

Putting a few metronome ticks before the music starts can help you to line the tracks up and can be trimmed off later. Unfortunately it is unlikely that the tracks will stay exactly in time due to small variations in recording speed, though if the tracks are not too long it may be close enough. There is a common misconception that "digital" means it will be accurate to half a second per year - it's not true.